The man who had once been Joar Addam Nesossin, had become Asmodean, and was no, he supposed, Jasin Natael, was tuning his harp and thinking.

It was a rare quiet moment, in a corner of the Sun Palace in Cairhien, but he was far away, standing in a great hall and basking in the applause and adulation of admiring spectators – 'the best living,' they said, 'music flows from him as easily as water from a spring.' It was one of the finest performances of his life. It was also one of his last. He could recall, afterward, sitting and polishing his harp, when he first noticed the new lines in his forehead. He stared at them, disbelieving. Still young then, never before had Joar Addam Nesossin entertained any thoughts of the future that were not full of grandeur, of glory, of music.

But he thought of them now. Days when his fingers would stiffen and no longer play, when his hearing would fail and he could no longer hear his music, when – worst of all – a younger player would step up and take his place, and the people's fickle attention would turn from him to delight in the bright star of a newcomer. He felt ill. And Joar Addam Nesossin thought then that he would find a way to avoid that. At any costs. He would be the best musician that ever lived.

Asmodean – he still called himself that – felt his mouth twist, wryly. And now…and now. His name was all but forgotten, and his music even more so. Nothing remained of those dreams of fame and glory but this – serving the Dragon Reborn, playing the part of a gleeman.

He felt a prickle of disdain, thinking of al'Thor. The man wasn't a tenth of what Lews Therin had been. Asmodean feared, in the dark hours, that even teaching all he could it would not be enough. And he had no illusions about his place if Tarmon Gai'don went badly. And that place was dead. The only possible chance for living was if al'Thor won; and even then he doubted that his life would be worth much for long.

Though the analogy was unappealing, to say the least, Asmodean thought of himself as a rabbit caught between a dog and a fox, both closing fast. They would certainly fight, and more likely than not he would die in the fray. If the fox won – it was easy to say he'd be eaten. The dog, perhaps not. And maybe if he moved fast enough he could escape both. He just had to look for his chance. And there would be one, somewhere, of that he was sure. And if he could get far enough away…

Then what? Then he could go back to hiding. Go back down his rabbit hole.

Asmodean had never wanted to hide. Asmodean wanted to be famous, to be visible. Someone had accused him, once, in his younger days, of being an exhibitionist. He had laughed, then. If they could see him now – scuttling through the shadows…

At least he had one thing to his favor. He hadn't aged, or at least barely, in the incomprehensible years it had been since he'd last walked this world – or what this world had been once. He hadn't grown old. And he was still the best musician in the world.

And what good did it do him? It wasn't as though anyone remembered. Wasn't as though anyone could tell. After all, he was only a simple gleeman, for most people not worth much more than a glance, even if he was the Lord Dragon's gleeman. Asmodean resisted the urge to sneer.

After all, the Lord Dragon might be his only hope for any kind of survival. And no matter what kind of life it was, Asmodean valued his life at a high price. Even if no one else did.

Or, he corrected himself, only valued it if it was taken.

There was a dissonant twang and he looked down with a scowl. He'd tuned the string too far, and it curled up, snapped in two. He started to laugh, bitterly, finding the whole thing suddenly funny. I need a drink, he thought, and stood, still chuckling, to find the wine cabinet.